Sans Noir
by WhatTheHammer
Summary: Follows AC plotline in a manner of speaking. Mike, a female, fights as a mercenary and somehow falls in love with Loz, an assumed enemy. Both sides come to grips with the realization, and Mike struggles to accept the end. SPOILERS! But I will warn you of
1. A Vital Interruption

While I loathe the fact that this is necessary, I'll add the bloody disclaimer. This is a work of FANFICTION, which means that I do not own any of the characters hereby mentioned other than Mike, who is a girl. She's me if I were in FVII: AC. ALL characters OTHER than "Mike" belong to Square Enix.

This takes place sort of in a parallel universe to AC, even though the event occur, it's not all about Jenova and Sephy-san.

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"What's the matter?" She teased, the smirk on her full lips tugging into a crescendo of visual sarcasm. A single blonde bang fell in front of one of her hazel green eyes and only served to make her look more devious. Tossing her head lightly to her left, the bang follow suit and tried to tuck itself behind her ear. When the gesture failed to achieve the intended goal, Mike simply ignored the taunting sheet of hair and kept her eyes of hazel flame on her objective.

The silver haired opponent shared in her smirk, and pressed his hand into his glove, five loud cracks resounding at the pressure. Looking down to his challenger, Loz took another daring step closer, his resolve seemingly only strengthened.

"I thought you liked women that could kick your ass…" Mike taunted, her brow dancing as she continued to assail him with visual and verbal jeers.

Loz grinned.

"I do, but you're certainly not kicking my ass." His reply was witty and sarcastic and Mike's grin only broadened.

"Well then let me see if I can fix that."

Rushing forward, Mike's fists flew in a peach blur towards the man's head. Tilting his head to the left, Loz avoided one of her blows, but her left hook managed to hit his cheek hard. In a surge of energy, Mike lifted her leg and struck him roughly in the stomach. Her boot managed to make quite an impression on his torso, and the air left his lungs in a quick grunt. Despite having taken his share of punches, Loz was by no means deterred, or even fazed. The blows rolled off of him like water over duck feathers, and he straightened to retaliate.

Fists struck wherever the intended target didn't expect them to. Unexpected signs of violent affection made their marks on the other's bodies. Bruises, small cuts, all tokens of what the other considered to be love.

After a good strike to the face, Mike stumbled backwards a slight ways and took a brief moment to catch her breath. Loz stepped forward, his boots crunching on the glass that they had broken when Loz had caught Mike's leg and flung her into a nearby window. Mike, however, evened the score by sending a series of blows to Loz's silver cropped head, which made his vision hazy for a good while.

Seeming to have no inclination to give up fighting, Mike began to draw her fist back again to strike, but Loz stepped forward and caught her fist with his hand. Her strength caused his hand to move backwards a considerable bit, but his firm grip on her clenched fist did not wane.

The breath stuttered out of Mike as her eyes opened wider when her blow was so obviously deflected. Taking the moment of inaction to refuel her lungs with oxygen, Mike's chest heaved up and down with the effort of refilling her lungs. There was a slight sheen of sweat over her body causing her clothes to stick to her, particularly in the center of her back and on her chest. The simple black tank was riddled with sweat, but Loz did not step away.

Once the pressure against the palm of his hand was gone, Loz lowered his arm from over his head and let Mike's hand fall from his, swinging alone, unattended by her side. Lifting her head to better look at him, Mike studied the expression he wore. His eyes were closed, pensive as his face was turned towards hers. There were small cuts on his cheeks, even one that crossed his lip, but the blood had dried and his face still looked to Mike to be strong and determined, despite his calm visage.

"Had en-…" Mike had meant to administer another sardonic remark when Loz leaned down and silenced her. The motion was soft, smooth, one that looked practiced in lieu of the fact that Loz had never been given a chance to enjoy the perks of having someone to be close to, or to share such affection for. Everything about him was rough, hard. His hands were callused from wielding his weapon for hours of end in vast training fields where he ruthlessly slaughtered anything that got in his way. A pair of boot stuffed feet wore the scars of many hours laboring in unfavorable environments. Even his smile appeared as if he were trying to crack through stone. There was nothing remotely soft or tender about Loz, or so everyone who had met him expected as much.

There was one thing that remained startling smooth and velvet. A pair of currently split lips. They felt to Mike like feathers, the feathers of a chickadee. So smooth and perfect, however apparent her split was.

The crack in his bottom lip brushed softly over Mike's, and she breathed out, forcing her air into his mouth.

Both pair of hands, rough, cracked, and callused, remained contentedly dormant at their sides. The mere brush of lips was enough of an expression. However violent their usual spars were, whoever was declared the winner, there was nothing as tender as sharing breath. Neither bothered to intensify their contact, it would have made such a contradiction to what they shared. Fighting, sparring, training with the other was a pastime, some way that they could strengthen their bodies and watch the other grow in their power.

Pulling away, Loz slid his eyes open to look at his lover's face, to see how she looked when she was so close and so obviously his. In the broken second that Loz had to observe her, his perfectly divine lips stretched into a soft smile.

Though the light in the room was partial, it fell across her face and illuminated her. It made her the brightest thing in the room, made it look as if she radiated and glowed from her centre, sending off light beams to the darkest corners. Her lips were slightly damp from where his had met with hers, caught her soul by taking her lips and making them part of his being. Two eyelids, two thin curtains for such mind-numbingly gorgeous hazel green eyes, quivered. From his position above her, Loz could read every movement of her eyes as the lids reflected the motion.

When they reached the zenith of their shivering, Loz saw the curtain draw, revealing to him those intoxicating green eyes. They were confused, why had he pulled away, why had he stopped? Her full lips stretched into what Loz knew to be an amusing remark. That was always her way, everything was heated words of pending violence or sarcasm. It was funny, so light-hearted, and yet so dire. Deliciously contradicting.

As he brought his mouth to join hers once more, he thought that "delicious" was the perfect way to describe her. She was salty from the sweat that had run onto her swollen lips, and yet there was something distinctly spicy about her flavor.

God, she was perfect. A breath of life into his.

Mobilizing her hands, Mike placed both of her palms against his chest, simply letting them rest there as she made their breathing coincide. Their lips remained tenderly pressed, on the verge of no longer touching, and they shared breath. Loz could no longer tell his breath from hers, their lungs had synchronized so well, two bodies relying on the other for life. It was so much more meaningful than any sexual encounter or lusty moment. Sex did not require the other's cooperation, sex could not understand what it meant to need the other body for their life. As far as Loz was concerned, this was all the more physical contact he needed to satisfy him. His trust was hers entirely when he realized that she could suck the breath from his lungs and steal his life through his mouth if she felt thus.

Loz's existence relied on her…in the moment and in reality. What he would do if she wasn't there? His survival physically would continue, but the person he had become would crumble away until all that was left was a shell.

Placing his hands over hers, Loz pressed hers to his body. Maybe Mike could feel how his lungs were responding to her. It was a stupid thing to do, really. Almost a childish gesture. Before Mike, Loz had been nothing more than an overgrown child, incapable of making his own decisions and thinking for himself. She had been so hateful and cold to him when they'd first met…she hated his weakness.

But that part of his life was over. He was a child no longer.

Allowing their lips to move apart, both parties remained close, resuming their breathing, accustoming themselves to breathing on their own, the breath that they expelled warming the other's moist lips. Rubbing his middle and index finger together, Loz felt their callus before he took his middle finger and ran it over her bottom lip, which was so beautifully puffed. When his rough fingertip met her lip, Mike closed her eyes again and let her mouth remain parted. When Loz slipped his finger somewhat into the interior of her mouth, feeling the slick moisture of her inner lip, he grunted. Putting his hand on the back of her head, Loz let his fingertip slide down to her collarbone and brought her face towards his. Snatching her bottom lip between his teeth, Loz tugged, pulled so gently, working her lip, pulling her mouth into his.

Passion, it raged within his body as if it were a tiger that Loz had kept caged for too long. It was neglected, battered, cold, but somehow incredibly persistent. He grunted slightly as the space between them heated externally with the internal fire blazing within them. Mike's skin was warm, Loz could feel the burning in her core and was surprised that her lips hadn't singed his.

Venturing a small peak at her while they were so close, Loz slid his eyes open a little, intending to pull away so that he could get a better picture of her. However, the first image that danced across his eyes was not Mike's face, eyes closed, mouth open and slick, but it was Kadaj that swam into view like a lurking shark. He was leaning against the doorway of the room with his arms folded across his chest and an unreadable expression playing on his face.

Suddenly letting go of her, Loz pulled away as if Mike were made of lava and she had burned him. His teeth had left her lower lip damp, shining with his saliva, and also marvelously plump. Taking a step backwards, Loz watched as Mike's entranced look became one of confusion and pain.

"Loz, what's wrong?" her words floated over to him and smacked him in the face, causing more damage than any of her lethal punches ever could.

Keeping his eyes on the figure of Kadaj, Loz intended to remove himself from Mike, but he would not leave her until Kadaj was gone. It wasn't about her, she wasn't involved other than to consider her guilty by association. Kadaj, sensing that Loz wasn't going to just leave his lover alone with him, consented to his brother's logic, and turned to leave the building.

Lox remained motionless until he could hear the nearly inaudible rumbling of Kadaj's motorcycle growl into the distance.

Mike, however, had been completely oblivious to Kadaj's presence, and was still concerned about his behavior.

Her boots crunched over glass, the sound nearly cleaving Loz's head in half. The shriek of the glass under her rubber soled boots was enough to make him grimace at the sound.

More shards voiced their protest of Mike's progression towards him, causing Loz's head to fill with pain. The ache was overwhelming, what was happening to him?

"Loz, what the hell is the matter with you?" she asked, stopping once she realized the equivalent exchange that they currently shared. It was no longer tender sharing of breath and life force, but an exchange of steps. For every one she took, he also took.

Backing away from her entirely, Loz turned around, away from her, and ran.


	2. An Enemy of Kin

Kadaj's snicker of laughter echoed in Loz's ears, nearly causing him to grimace. To think that he had witnessed something so personal, so private…it made Loz's flesh crawl with fiery hatred. Simply sharing space with Kadaj was threatening to coax Loz's violent nature to the surface.

As Loz watched his brother start to idly walk around the dank, deserted room, Loz sincerely wished he'd not followed him. What was there to prove, or to gain? Standing up to him, like Mike so often urged him to do, was useless now. Kadaj already knew what Loz had done. "Fraternized with the enemy," "betrayed kin." Anything that Kadaj didn't plan was considered betrayal. The free thought and will that Loz had just discovered, living as a human being…they all were forms of treachery to Kadaj.

"You're such a fool." Kadaj's snakelike charm never failing to disappoint had Loz's fists clenched into tight balls of white fury at his sides. The tightening muscles rippled up into his shoulder and neck, throbbing as Loz's clenched so firmly. He knew that Kadaj would never be afraid of him, never take him seriously, but Loz couldn't help but think that if Kadaj continued to antagonize him, that he'd awaken some hidden beast deep within Loz. It was a childhood fantasy, Kadaj had always been the brain of every operation, and Loz had been the brawn. He felt like some hideous giant that was jerked around by a ring in his nose to do whatever his master dictated.

No more.

The younger brother neared the elder with a certain acquired swagger, calm and arrogant as if he carried the knowledge of the cosmos on his slender shoulders.

Lifting his icy glare, Loz eyed his brother carefully. There was no trust now. No camaraderie. The same blood, the kinship, it meant nothing to Kadaj anymore. As far as he was concerned, Loz was no longer family. Three months ago, that would have broken Loz's heart, possibly to the point of tears, but not now. Not after he'd opened his eyes to the reality that he'd spent so much time shutting out.

"Shut up." Loz hissed, his harsh words enhanced by a glacial visage. Every line on his face expressed nothing short of dire, immeasurable abhorrence.

Kadaj's brows arched for a moment as he heard Loz's gruff response. It was shocking enough that Loz hadn't already crumbled underneath Kadaj yet, but the angry retort was something that Kadaj would never have expected from Loz. Though he was older, he had always been easy to overpower.

Kadaj realized now that this was no longer the case, and his eyes flashed hatefully.

Narrowing his eyes into slits of indignant confusion, Kadaj took a step closer to Loz.

"What did you say to me?" he asked, standing still and allowing his eyes to rove over Loz, as if he were trying to detect something unseen and foul around his brother. He could almost _smell_ that whore he'd been with earlier…Kadaj hated her.

"I said to shut the hell up." Loz repeated, the reply somehow iced fire, a wondrous strange frost. Hearing his brother, Kadaj's hand slid to the hilt of his sword and Loz rested his hand on the grip of his gun in case a quick draw was necessary. It grieved him that he had to feel this cautious around his brother, but Mike had opened his eyes. There was no longer any façade of trust and brotherhood. That had disappeared long ago, as Loz was just now realizing. Loz could finally see Kadaj for what he was; an obsessive, manipulative, selfish boy. It was insulting to think that, for so long, Loz had been his puppet.

He was going to sever the strings now.

Sneering, Kadaj's lip shrank back into a scornful curl.

"Don't let her ruin everything we've worked for."

"Everything we've worked for has been shit." Loz answered harshly, hardly allowing Kadaj to finish his sentence before interjecting.

Silver hair swished over his forehead as Kadaj shook his head, unable to believe what he was hearing.

"Don't do this, she's not worth it!" he bellowed, his voice reaching a panicked state. The worry in his eyes was unnerving, almost sad. He stood before Loz, a stripped man. Once the curtain had torn and fallen to the floor, there was nothing to hide Kadaj's intentions anymore. He was the master, Loz had been his dog.

"She is worth everything!" Loz's voice rose to such a huge crescendo that Kadaj was momentarily silenced by the hateful power that his kin was exerting.

Loz's fist was clenched tightly around his gun grip, half of his upper body becoming numb as he held onto the weapon so tightly.

"That bitch has turned you into a child and poisoned you against your own family! Don't let her destroy everything!"

_"NO!"_

Another shout threatened to rupture Kadaj's eardrum. "She has shown me what it means to be a man, and opened my eyes to my idiocy."

Pausing for a moment, Kadaj seemed to regain shards of his lost composure, piecing them together to try to rebuild himself.

"So a chance encounter with a whore that will give you what you want makes you think that you're in love? You'll throw everything away to be with your slut?" Kadaj asked, smirking spitefully. "It's a shame you're so immature, or else you would see that she's only using you. Don't cry, Loz. You were bound to find out eventually. Now come back to us, come back to Mother!"

Every cell inside of Loz shook with the active suppression of his hatred. Flashes of red tainted his vision as he began to indulge himself. Violent, deliciously violent images sped across his mind. Loz holding fistfuls of pristinely silver hair as Kadaj's severed neck poured hot crimson onto the floor; Loz gripping his brother's delicate neck and squeezing until he felt Kadaj's trachea snap…

"You could never understand. Sex can't make you a man." Knives danced across Loz's tongue as he tried to speak civilly to Kadaj. He never would have thought that Kadaj would inspire such disgust, Loz never imagined his life without his brothers in it…and yet, all he could think about was divorcing himself from his family entirely. Mother, his siblings…they didn't matter anymore.

Loz could feel his face flush with a bright daub of scarlet ire. Drawing his gun from the holster around his waist, Loz pointed it at Kadaj and cocked a bullet into place.

"Don't insult her. Mother is _gone, _she isn't worth anything. Nothing we thought was."

Kadaj remained smugly stoic, clearly unfazed by the thought of being shot, but was indeed shocked to see Loz pointing his gun at his face. Kadaj knew Loz's gun well, despite his brother's seeming indifference to use it in battle. He knew the mechanical advancements, and, despite how little credit he offered Loz, Kadaj knew Loz's aim was precise. A pull of the trigger, the slightest twitch of Loz's finger, and Kadaj would be nothing more than a bloody memory. Splatters on the floor for brotherhood.

Moving his head slightly to the side to look around the gun's barrel and into Loz's eye, Kadaj feigned another smug smirk and lifted his foot to take a step forward.

"Loz,"

Kadaj had not placed his boot on the ground when Loz moved his arm downward. His finger twitched. One lead bullet drove forth from the barrel. Though the echo was loud, Loz could hardly hear it over the echo of his bullet burying into layers of flesh, tissue, bone, and then exiting as rudely as it was come. Blood sprayed out from the wound, landing on the concrete behind Kadaj before he could consciously react.

A terrific shriek let Loz know that he had indeed shattered Kadaj's kneecap into powder. He collapsed to the ground, landing heavily on the leg that could no longer support him. Only the recycled ricochet of Kadaj's pained scream remained, but the gushing and gurgling of rapid blood loss was enough to remind Loz of his deed.

Turning to exit, Loz walked to the door and then paused, having no intent to aid his brother.

"Mother is dead, and should stay that way. Accept it and live your fucking life."

Resuming his abandoned step, Loz exited the building, the open door allowing the sunlight into a room filled with darkness. Not two feet from the door, Kadaj retaliated. Another bullet flew, striking Loz in the shoulder and embedding into his bone, thus allowing large amounts of crimson to spew from his body. Lurching forward, Loz stumbled to his knees, managing only to deflect his rendezvous with the ground for a moment before he crashed to the concrete. Air forced from his lips in a staggered grunt as he fell, a scarlet trail following his descent. Loz scratched his face on the concrete, leaving small pinpricks of blood.

Grimacing and forgetting his brother entirely, Loz gathered his feet from underneath him and used the arm he could to push himself wearily to his feet. Staggering greatly as his vision spasmed before him, Loz walked as quickly and steadily as he could in the direction of Mike's apartment.


End file.
